April 5, 2019

Jn 7: 1-2, 10, 25-30

After this Jesus went about in Galilee. He did not wish to go about in Judea because the Jews were looking for an opportunity to kill him. Now the Jewish festival of Booths was near. But after his brothers had gone to the festival, then he also went, not publicly but as it were in secret.

Now some of the people of Jerusalem were saying, “Is not this the man whom they are trying to kill? And here he is, speaking openly, but they say nothing to him! Can it be that the authorities really know that this is the Messiah? Yet we know where this man is from; but when the Messiah comes, no one will know where he is from.”

Then Jesus cried out as he was teaching in the temple, “You know me, and you know where I am from. I have not come on my own. But the one who sent me is true, and you do not know him. I know him, because I am from him, and he sent me.” Then they tried to arrest him, but no one laid hands on him, because his hour had not yet come.

New Revised Standard Version, copyright 1989, by the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved. USCCB approved.

Opening our hardened hearts

“Yet we know where this man is from; but when the Messiah comes, no one will know where he is from.”

How can one categorize the uncontainable Christ? When I was younger, I wanted to rationalize Jesus, to prove him as if he were a mathematical theorem. I wanted to know from where he came and where he was going. At times, like those in John’s narrative today, I thought I knew – how foolish! Then came my encounter with Him. While walking the grounds on retreat I felt an immense silence. It was Jesus, whispering, “You need not prove me. Be not proud, but in the awareness that you cannot disprove me open your heart and surrender to me.”

This Lent are our hardened hearts open to Him? May we surrender them that our joy may be complete!

—Stephen Hutchison founded and leads Revitalization 2000, Inc., a nonprofit organization that emerged from St. Matthew the Apostle Catholic Church to assist its Ignatian-based mission to serve the poor in the surrounding neighborhood of north St. Louis.

Prayer

O Jesus, there You standalone and diminishedvictim to the human conditionand a world closing in on You.You know this path leadsto deathas it too leads me.May Your surrender fill me with gratitudefor it shows me the transformative pathfrom human to divinefrom death to rising.Christ, let predisposition and preoccupation harden not my heartand numb me to Your boundless presence.Open my heart to You thatYour love might overflow onto meand from there onto others.

—Stephen Hutchison

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April 5, 2019

Jn 7: 1-2, 10, 25-30

After this Jesus went about in Galilee. He did not wish to go about in Judea because the Jews were looking for an opportunity to kill him. Now the Jewish festival of Booths was near. But after his brothers had gone to the festival, then he also went, not publicly but as it were in secret.

Now some of the people of Jerusalem were saying, “Is not this the man whom they are trying to kill? And here he is, speaking openly, but they say nothing to him! Can it be that the authorities really know that this is the Messiah? Yet we know where this man is from; but when the Messiah comes, no one will know where he is from.”

Then Jesus cried out as he was teaching in the temple, “You know me, and you know where I am from. I have not come on my own. But the one who sent me is true, and you do not know him. I know him, because I am from him, and he sent me.” Then they tried to arrest him, but no one laid hands on him, because his hour had not yet come.

New Revised Standard Version, copyright 1989, by the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved. USCCB approved.

Opening our hardened hearts

“Yet we know where this man is from; but when the Messiah comes, no one will know where he is from.”

How can one categorize the uncontainable Christ? When I was younger, I wanted to rationalize Jesus, to prove him as if he were a mathematical theorem. I wanted to know from where he came and where he was going. At times, like those in John’s narrative today, I thought I knew – how foolish! Then came my encounter with Him. While walking the grounds on retreat I felt an immense silence. It was Jesus, whispering, “You need not prove me. Be not proud, but in the awareness that you cannot disprove me open your heart and surrender to me.”

This Lent are our hardened hearts open to Him? May we surrender them that our joy may be complete!

—Stephen Hutchison founded and leads Revitalization 2000, Inc., a nonprofit organization that emerged from St. Matthew the Apostle Catholic Church to assist its Ignatian-based mission to serve the poor in the surrounding neighborhood of north St. Louis.

Prayer

O Jesus, there You standalone and diminishedvictim to the human conditionand a world closing in on You.You know this path leadsto deathas it too leads me.May Your surrender fill me with gratitudefor it shows me the transformative pathfrom human to divinefrom death to rising.Christ, let predisposition and preoccupation harden not my heartand numb me to Your boundless presence.Open my heart to You thatYour love might overflow onto meand from there onto others.